Turkey’s Elections Get Interesting…Fact Vs. Fiction

Seems some people in Turkey have decided that the available options are not good enough and prefer to conjure up their own fictional candidate to run the country. This composite character is an amalgam of ALL of Turkey’s minorities and identities and proves there is a love of freedom and tons of creativity in Turkey today…let’s just hope their voice is loud and strong enough to drown out the intolerance that has become a staple for too long in Turkey.

Here’s the candidates home on the World Wide Web. My source {Hat tip to R} explains:

It’s a hypothetical candidate for president in Turkey, I really wish there was such a figure. However, there are already 32 supports from the parliament for this non-existing candidate–which is a good thing I guess. I mean, it shows that there are at least some deputies there who are true democrats.

In the news section there are short reports of her visits to various and neglected/silenced/supressed groups of Turkey such as transexuals, conscientious objectors etc. The latest news is about her attendance to the protest of the recent bloody murder in Malatya.

Translation about who Aliye Öztürk is:

Aliye Öztürk(English Translation)

Aliye Öztürk who was born in İstanbul Üsküdar in 1966, so to say embodies all the differences and richnesses of Turkey with her interesting life story. His grandfather who was a Kurdish Nakşî sheikh from Urfa died a martyr in the Gallipoli wars which he volunteered and his father who was born in İstanbul, has married to a Turkish Alevi girl whose family migrated from Thessaloniki to Sivas during the Balkan wars. As Aliye Öztürk moved around all over Turkey with her parents who are both teachers, she pursued her primary and secondary education in state schools in various cities of Turkey and graduated from high school in Istanbul since his father was removed from service after the 12 September coup d’état. Aliye Öztürk’s story is actually the story of Turkey who finally discovered as a result of her own research that her maternal grandmother was an Armenian orphan adopted by a family in Tarbzon.

Öztürk has graduated from Middle East Technical University Political Science and Public Administration Department in 1988 as the valedictorian of her class, and she holds an MA degree from Columbia University with her thesis titled ‘Presidential Elections in Turkey’ and a PhD degree in political science from Leiden University with her thesis titled ‘Official Ideology and Civilian Rule: Coup D’états in Turkey.’ When she was removed from her position at the university during the 28 February period because of wearing a headscarf, she lectured as a part-time faculty member in Leiden University of the Netherlands, Columbia University of the USA, Al-Azhar University of Egypt, Muin University of Iran and Tubingen University of Germany.

Aliye Öztürk worked as a director in the projects of UNICEF in South Africa and she was awarded an eminent service medal by Nelson Mandela due to her role and effort in cleansing the remains of the racist Apartheid regime.

Aliye Öztürk who is still an active member of NGOs such as Young Civilians, Political Horizaon Movement, Meeting Forum, Amnesty International and Greenpeace, is married with 4 children. Öztürk speaks Kurdish, the Zaza language, English, German, Arabic and Persian, and is the writer of numerous articles published in various languages and 20 books about political and social issues including a book of poems titled ‘Innocence.’ Being engaged in many sports including football, riding, athleticism and ice skating, Öztürk is a good movie audience and music lover who is extremely interested in instruments such as kanun, bağlama, and ney.